


phones are the enemy of positive human connection

by diefacingourfoes



Category: Spring Awakening - Sheik/Sater
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Happy Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-02
Updated: 2016-02-02
Packaged: 2018-05-17 19:11:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5882245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diefacingourfoes/pseuds/diefacingourfoes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moritz rants on the phone to Melchior a lot.</p>
            </blockquote>





	phones are the enemy of positive human connection

“-and it’s not _fair_ that she would call on me when a bunch of other people had their hands up and I was obviously confused and it was clear I was _trying_ \- I mean I was paying attention and writing stuff down and stuff and she didn’t need to call on me for the answer- if she wanted to make an example out of someone, she should have just picked one of the people who were texting in the back or-“

            “Calm down.” Melchior’s voice was steady- Moritz panicked at him over the phone about something or other at least once a week.

            “It’s not fair!” repeated Moritz. He paced back and forth in his room while he talked, trying to vent off excess energy without resorting to pulling on his already messy hair like he did without meaning to too often. There’s enough hair on a human head for a few missing strands not to matter, but Moritz found himself doing the nervous tic enough to think that it could have a noticeable effect if he kept at it. He had enough to worry about without adding bald spots to the list.

            “I’m sure no one was judging you,” said Melchior. “They probably didn’t know the answer, either.”

            “ _You_ did.”

            There was a pause. “Yeah,” said Melchior, trying to think of some way to soften the statement without saying what they were both thinking, which was that Melchior was smarter than almost everyone, if not everyone, in their class.

            “And I always raise my hand when I do know the answer!” continued Moritz. “I don’t _like_ participating in class, but you told me that if I raise my hand when I know the answer, she’ll be less likely to call on me when I don’t. So I do. But she never calls on me when I know the answer, and she always calls on me when I’m really confused.” Moritz sat down on his bed, knocking his heels against each other too harshly.

            “Teachers suck, Moritz,” said Melchior. “At least most of them do. They want to see us fail.” There was a comfortable silence after that. Melchior was back in familiar territory.

            Moritz tried to picture him, imagine what he was doing. Homework, maybe, scratching down letters during the pauses in their conversation. Leaning back in his chair while he did something productive on the computer, which probably had a million tabs open. He was doing something while he talked to Moritz, that was for sure. Melchior was good at multitasking.

            Moritz pictured him lying on his bed, curly hair crushed against the pillow as he talked, all of his attention focused on the phone conversation. It was a nice image. Moritz let it linger in his head for a second.

            “Moritz? You still there?”

            Moritz had never responded to Melchior’s comment, he realized. He had just let himself space out and dreamily picture his best friend while Melchior awkwardly waited for him to say something. He was sure Melchior was used to that; it was hardly unusual, coming from him. Still, he hated to keep him waiting.

            “I’m here,” said Moritz. At some point, his feet had stopped moving. He sat up on the bed, perfectly still.

            “Are you okay?”

            Moritz smiled a bit. “I’m fine.”

            There was another awkward pause.

            “What are you doing?” Moritz suddenly spurted. He berated himself silently. It wasn’t a bad question to have asked, exactly, but it was a little off topic. A little too close to the ubiquitous “what are you wearing.”

            “What am I doing?” asked Melchior. The tone suggested he didn’t find Moritz’s question strange. “I’m sitting at my desk, talking to you. Why?”

            “I don’t know,” said Moritz. His feet started fidgeting again, seemingly of their own accord. “I just assumed you were, like, doing something else too.”

            “Nah,” said Melchior.

            Moritz searched for something to say, then finally settled on “Okay.”

            He didn’t have any right to feel so nervous when talking to Melchior. He was an anxious person in general, sure, but after eight years of friendship, Melchior should be the exception to that. And he had been, at one time. But that had been before-

            Anyway, they were talking on the phone. Phone conversations were always more awkward. You couldn’t see the person’s face, tell what they were thinking. Everything is slightly off. It seems like there’s less holding you back from a slip of the tongue, from saying exactly the worst thing to say to exactly the worst person.

            Moritz could almost feel Melchior analyzing his silence, using it to peer into the depths of his brain. He always felt slightly psychoanalyzed with Melchior around. He didn’t mind it, usually. Lately, it had made him more uncomfortable. Worried about what Melchior might find.

            “You know you can tell me anything, right?” asked Melchior.

            Of course he couldn’t. “Yeah,” said Moritz.

            “Good.”

            The ensuing pause was even longer than the previous ones.

            “Well, I should go,” said Moritz. He always wanted to talk to Melchior. But he couldn’t stand one more second of this phone conversation.

“Okay,” said Melchior. “Well, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” said Moritz. “Bye.”

“Bye. Love you.”

Moritz’s index finger stopped where it was hovering over the “end call” button. Slowly, he brought the phone back to his ear. “What?”

“Oh,” said Melchior. He laughed, nervously. “Did I say that? I didn’t mean to say that.”

Moritz waited.

“I- was talking to my grandmother earlier today. Most of the people who I talk to on the phone are my relatives, and then, you know, you always end it with a ‘love you.’ That’s all.”

“You’re getting really defensive about this,” said Moritz. A block of ice started to solidify in the pit of his stomach. He knew. He knew, and now he was afraid that Moritz was going to start getting ideas because of one comment he had made by accident.

Melchior sighed. Moritz imagined him running his hand backwards through his hair like he did when he was frustrated or thinking. “Look,” said Melchior. There was a note of resignation in his voice. “I know that- how I feel about you- makes you uncomfortable. And I’m sorry for that. I can’t help it. I would if I could. But that really was just a slip up. I’m not going to try to make a move on you or anything, I promise.”

None of that made any sense at all. “How you feel about me?” Moritz was pretty sure his voice had squeaked.

Melchior didn’t respond for another few moments. “You mean-“ His voice sounded stunned. Then he laughed, and laughed again. Moritz couldn’t help but feel made fun of. “Crap,” Melchior said. “You didn’t know. Everyone said you knew. I should have known better than to listen to them.”

“I didn’t know what?” asked Moritz. He had returned to pacing around the room. Everything seemed sharper, all of a sudden. His senses felt heightened. It was like he was being bombarded with sensation.

Again, there was no response. And there was no response. And there was no response. It was very urgent that there should be a response immediately.

“That I’m in love with you,” said Melchior. His voice sounded dead.

Moritz stopped, suddenly, his frantic pacing. His fists unclenched themselves. The progress of time seemed to freeze.

            “What?” It was all he could manage to get out. He took a few seconds. Regained his composure. “Melchi, are you making fun of me?” His voice was young. Vulnerable. He hated it.

“No,” said Melchior hurriedly. “No, of course not. I…No. Of course not.”

Moritz sat down, on the floor, right where he was. It was taking some time to process. His mind latched onto another word. “Everyone?”

“Yeah,” said Melchior. “Everyone knows. Our friends, my parents, even some of the teachers, I think. I guess it’s pretty obvious.”

Moritz furrowed his brow. “It’s not obvious to _me._ ”

“No!” said Melchior. “I meant- I didn’t mean to imply anything. Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” said Moritz. Melchior’s words swum around in his head, until he found something new to pick out. “My dad?”

“No,” said Melchior. “No, I don’t think so. I mean, definitely not. He would never let me see you again if he knew.”

Moritz nodded. “That’s true.” He could barely get words out. There was no room in his brain for language processing skills. He should say something. Tell Melchior that he felt the same way. He was obviously nervous. Moritz wouldn’t want someone to just leave him hanging, if he had just confessed their love to them. But he couldn’t get himself to do it. He had hammered the concept of concealing of his feelings for Melchior into his head for so long that he couldn’t get himself to stop even though he didn’t need to do it anymore.

He didn’t need to do it anymore. He tried to get that through his head. He couldn’t.

He tried to force words out. “I love you, too” or “I feel the same way” or even “Same.” But all he could get was “Do you want to go get ice cream or something sometime?”

Melchior was silent.

“Or a movie? Or…something?”

Melchior still didn’t say anything. He had screwed up again. He had somehow said the wrong thing.

“…Like a date?” he added when the quiet had stretched on too long.

“Really?” asked Melchior. He sounded kind of stunned.

“…yeah,” Moritz said after a few moments.

“Yeah,” said Melchior, the words coming out even more quickly than his normal speaking speed. “Yeah, that would be great. Does Saturday work for you?”

Moritz had to press his lips together to keep himself from smiling. He was picking at the lint on his carpet, but it was because of nervous energy and not general anxiety. “Saturday’s great.”

“Great,” echoed Melchior. “I’ll pick you up.”

“Sounds good.”

“Well,” said Melchior. “I’ll see you, then.”

“See you.”

The conversation was clearly over, but neither of them hung up. Moritz sat there, the phone to his ear.

“…this isn’t going to turn into a ‘you hang up, no you hang up’ kind of thing, is it?”

Moritz laughed, surprised. The tension finally seemed to be broken. “If we ever become that kind of couple, please tell my sister to throw me off a cliff.”

Couple. He shouldn’t have said couple. It was too early for that. But Melchior had used the word “love,” so maybe it wouldn’t be that bad.

“I’ll pass along the message.” Melchior seemed pleased.

“You do that.”

“I’m actually going to hang up now,” said Melchior.

“Okay,” said Moritz.

“Okay.”

A few seconds passed without anything happening, but then he heard the click, and he brought the phone away from his ear. His arm was tired, he realized, from holding it there so long. His conversations with Melchior were usually shorter than that.

He had a date.

Moritz smiled down at the phone in his hand. “You’re the best,” he whispered to it. Maybe phone conversations had their merits after all.


End file.
